


However Improbable

by Sir_Bedevere



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: (But not as you know it!), Drinking to Cope, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Light Angst, Loneliness, Pining, Rated for drug use, South Downs Cottage (Good Omens), World War I
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-17
Updated: 2019-10-17
Packaged: 2020-12-21 08:57:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21072281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sir_Bedevere/pseuds/Sir_Bedevere
Summary: 1915.A lonely angel and a tired demon aren't talking.At least, they aren’t talking toeach other.





	However Improbable

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lorelei](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lorelei/gifts).

> Your prompt gave me a ton of ideas, but these little scenes just wouldn't leave me be :)

_1915_

“It’s a nice enough place you have here, I suppose, but don’t you find it terribly dull?”

“The bees keep me busy these days,” Holmes said, replacing the last lid on the last hive. “You would be surprised at the complicated machinations of bee life.”

He’d once been as tall as Crowley was but his back was stooped as he turned to his visitor. He reached up to remove his ridiculous hat, and that same old eyebrow arched as he looked Crowley up and down. 

“You, sir, are unchanged. You could try a little harder to appear as though you are a quite ordinary person.”

Crowley grinned and took off his dark glasses. Holmes gazed thoughtfully at his yellow eyes, then shook his head. 

“Do come inside. I believe the housekeeper has prepared some tea. If you could replace your glasses, until she has been safely shooed away. I do not have time for anything dramatic this afternoon.”

Crowley followed him into the little cottage, pleased to see that although the detective had moved away from London, he’d maintained the eccentricity which made him so interesting. The walls of the cottage were covered in the same old scribbled on pages, stacks of books spilling across the floor and piles of strange items on tables. Crowley picked up what looked like a human leg bone and was about to ask, then decided that perhaps he didn’t need to know. 

“What is all this, Holmes? Surely there can’t be that many crimes to solve on the South Downs?”

“It would surprise you, perhaps, to know how many cases the people of Sussex have brought to me. But no, you are correct; most of this is research.”

He gestured vaguely at the mess as he tipped himself into a chair, and Crowley sat opposite as the housekeeper came in with the tea on a tray. 

“Research, he calls it,” she said, pouring the milk. “A lot of rubbish, if you ask me.”

“Nobody did, if you recall,” Holmes said mildly. “But your objection has been noted. Please leave us. I am quite capable of pouring the tea.”

Crowley chuckled as the housekeeper swept out, slamming the door behind her. The impact forced a pile of books to tumble forlornly to the floor. Holmes rolled his eyes, then gestured for Crowley to remove his glasses. 

“So like a snake. Fascinating, fascinating.”

“Don’t let many people see them these days,” Crowley said, accepting a cup from Holmes’ trembling hands. “Not like the old days. Back when stories and myths and real life were all a bit more fluid. No one seemed to mind it back then.”

Holmes nodded sagely. “I do believe there is a great deal of things that antiquarians could learn from you, Anthony.”

“Probably.”

Holmes smirked into his teacup. It was an old conversation, one they’d had many times since they’d run into one another, and Holmes had deduced that Crowley was not of Earth. It had taken him an embarrassingly short amount of time to do it, too, but at least he’d been calm and composed about it. Most people who knew Crowley’s true nature had ended up being confined to mad houses for jabbering on about demons with yellow eyes. 

“It’s been a long time since you came to visit, Anthony. What have you been doing?”

“Sleeping.”

“Why?”

“I like to sleep.”

“What about your friend? Hasn’t he been missing your company? Surely it is a lonely existence.”

Crowley was very determined that his face should remain un-blushing, so it did. But as he picked up his tea cup and glanced at Holmes over the rim, he saw the detective looking at him as though his face had gone the reddest of reds. 

“We- had a disagreement. I haven’t seen him for a while.”

“Ah.”

The clock over the fireplace ticked incessantly, and the silence stretched on as Holmes chose a small cake from the arrangement on the tray. Crowley wasn’t sure he’d ever seen the man eat - it was one of the things that he’d noticed most about him, when they spent days together in the opiate dens of the East End. Crowley had never partaken himself, but Holmes talked his most fascinating talk in those filthy places, and Crowley had always been good at identifying another being in distress. It came with the demon territory, really. It was just that he didn’t exploit it. Not much anyway. 

“There was a very long time, I recall, that Watson and I did not speak,” Holmes said suddenly. “And although he departed this world on good terms with me, I regret the years that we did not have.” 

Crowley looked up sharply. Bloody Holmes and his bloody dazzling intellect.

It had been a long time since he saw Aziraphale, longer than Holmes and Watson had together as friends in their entire lives. It was always the way with humans. He wondered what the angel was doing - when Crowley had woken, he hadn’t been able to feel him in London, but he also hadn’t cared to search further afield. As long as Aziraphale hadn’t got himself mixed up in the bloody war, it would be fine to leave him a while longer. Crowley wasn’t sure he had the strength yet to seek him out.

Holmes didn’t press him, thank Someone. Instead, he was already hauling himself to his feet. 

“Come, let me show you the fossilised bones I have been collecting at the beach. You will find them very funny, I’m sure.”

Crowley followed him through to the small back room that was, in truth, just an extension of the mess in the front parlour. Holmes shuffled slowly now, where once he had strode, and Crowley had a sudden urge to reach out and touch the old man’s shoulder.

It had been so long since he’d touched anyone.

***

“Aziraphale?”

“Yes.”

“It seems your mother had the same sense of humour as mine did,” Nurse Fisher chuckled, leaning back in her chair. “At least you can shorten yours to something respectable. There are rather limited options with ‘Phyrne’.”

“I think you have a lovely name,” Aziraphale smiled, reaching to top up his glass. “A Greek courtesan, I do believe.”

He didn’t mention it, of course, that he had in fact known the original Phryne.

“If she even existed,” Nurse Fisher grumbled. “I have my doubts about most of those old stories. Too much myth all tied up with history, if you ask me. We’re on much safer ground post-Classical, wouldn’t you agree?”

Aziraphale only shrugged and sipped his wine. They’d been watering it down all night to try and make the bottle last longer, but with a small amount of thought, the wine had maintained its potency. As a result, Nurse Fisher’s cheeks were quite red, her eyes bright, but as she was in control of her faculties, he didn’t fret too much. He’d see her safely to her room after, anyway. Rather selfishly, he hoped it would be a while before she turned in - he couldn’t quite remember the last time he’d enjoyed the company of a human more. 

“And what about Aziraphale, my dear Ezra?” she asked. “From what ancient tome did your parents dredge that? Sounds vaguely Biblical, I’d say.”

“I think they rather made it up,” he shrugged, which wasn’t a lie, as such. God had to invent names at some stage, after all. “I’ve never found the source. So I go by Ezra. Saves a lot of questions.”

Nurse Fisher took a large gulp of her drink, already reaching for the bottle that he was handing her. 

“Do you know, Ezra, if I didn’t know better, I’d say this bottle seems to be never ending. I am perfectly drunk, and we’re yet to finish it.”

“That’s French wine for you, I’m sure.”

If Aziraphale didn’t know better, he’d say the look she was giving him had an edge of knowing about it. There had been the odd human throughout the years that had given him a look like that, usually when he had been spending too much time with them. Maybe it was because he tended to enjoy humans who were sharp, and interesting to talk to, so of course there was every chance that in the end one of them might work out there was something unusual about him. But he could hardly help that. He had to talk to people. 

That, of course, was due in part to no small hint of desperation, at least lately. _Especially_ lately. He hadn’t seen or heard from Crowley in fifty years, the longest gap since the Arrangement began, and he was rather starved for company. 

_And_ they were in the middle of a war. No escaping that either. The worst war he’d ever seen, and he’d seen them all. 

He’d come across Nurse Fisher quite recently, as he’d settled for a while at the hospital in Belgium. It was a break really, from the never ending horror that was the front line, where he’d been posing as a medic. This time he was a porter, lending his strength to carrying wounded men, bathing them when the nurses were too busy, unpacking deliveries, helping in the kitchen - any and every thing he could do. 

Heaven had made it quite clear that this was a human war, and no miracles would be tolerated. Well, none that interfered much anyway (a caveat he’d created for himself). But he didn’t think it mattered if he used a brief touch of healing on a man screaming in pain. Or a thought to fill a wine bottle. It wasn’t selfish - Nurse Fisher had rather looked as though she needed it. 

“What are you thinking of, Ezra? You seem very far away.”

“Oh you know. I suppose the same things any of us are thinking about lately.”

“What a positively cryptic answer. You’re lucky I’m too drunk to press you.”

Nurse Fisher had been the one to adopt him as a friend, a novelty he’d been too happy to indulge, as he was usually the one to choose his human friends. But they’d met as he was using his full bodyweight and no small part of his strength to pin down a soldier who was flailing, screaming as though possessed, and Nurse Fisher was at Aziraphale’s side with the syringe to knock the man into unconsciousness. After they’d wrestled him into submission, his sleep hopefully dreamless, Nurse Fisher had touched Aziraphale’s hand.

“You’re new here, aren’t you?”

“I am,” he said, remembering to pant as though he was out of breath. “Ezra. Ezra Fell.”

“Phryne Fisher,” she’d replied, in that charming Australian accent. “Will you join me for coffee? It tastes ghastly, I’m afraid. ”

She was only a young woman, barely out of childhood, but she carried herself like someone much older, and seemed to collect people in her wake, as he would later find out. But for almost six months, Ezra had been her favourite. And Aziraphale was helpless, in no small doubt that had Crowley been here, the demon would be quite in love with her already. He’d always found it easier to favour humans than Aziraphale did, and he adored the funny ones. 

“I do believe I’ve had too much to drink,” Phryne announced suddenly, hauling herself to her feet. “And a lady always knows when to call it a day. At least, that’s what my mother is always telling me.”

“I’ll walk you to your room, my dear,” Aziraphale said, offering his arm. She took it without hesitation, her hand warm through his cotton porter’s jacket.

“Do you know, Ezra Fell,” she murmured, as they slipped down darkened corridors from the mess, heading towards the staff quarters. “Aziraphale Fell. Aziraphale. I have a feeling that you’re the strangest person I’ve ever met.”

“Oh my dear, you’re not the first to tell me that,” he said lightly. 

“No, I don’t suppose I am.”

A sister came from one of the wards and glared at them, a finger to her lips. Aziraphale used a small miracle, just a tiny one, to contain Phryne’s ringing voice.

“You never look tired. Did you know that? Everyone here is tired, practically on their knees. But you’re fresh as ever, each time I see you.”

“Youthful skin. My mother was the same.”

They stopped outside her door, and she turned to him, patting his cheek gently.

“I’m going to kiss you. And I don’t think you will, but please don’t take it as a declaration of intent. I have a question that I believe it will answer.”

A warm feeling settled in his chest as she smiled up at him, and his skin tingled as she snaked a hand to the back of his neck, stroking at his soft curls. He leaned forwards, just an inch or two. She winked at him, and kissed him gently on the mouth. She tasted of wine and the stew they’d eaten for supper, and Aziraphale allowed it because he’d always liked kissing, and it had been so _long_ since anyone touched him like this.

After a too brief moment, she pulled away and smiled, her thumb tracing his lips. 

“Well?” he asked. “Do you have your answer?”

“Oh yes,” she said. “I do. Goodnight, my darling.”

“Good night, dear Phryne.” 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my darling Misty for reading it several times and reassuring me I didn't sound insane.


End file.
